The New York Public bathhouse on E. 11th Street between Avenue A and Avenue B has a cool back story to it.

Photographer Eddie Adams (probably best known for the Vietnam-era photo of the man getting shot in the head) bought this bricked up abandoned space in the 80's early 90's when Alphabet City was known as the heroin capital of America. It was a huge risk. It took years and a lot of borrowed money, but he renovated it and began shooting in it. Eddie is known for some of the most memorable photographs of all time (the one of Louis Armstrong is my favorite).

Here's a quick look inside Bathhouse Studios, as its called now, in a scene from the DVD An Unlikely Weapon: The Eddie Adams Story. That's Rod Steiger in the video (he died in 2002). The clip begins with a setup by former CNN correspondent Peter Arnett - a friend of Adams - on how Adams came to find and purchase the abandoned space.

Adams himself died in 2004, but the studio lives on today...

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